American girl in Italy, 60 years later

@ehBeth,

Quote:

When jw posted at the beginning of the thread - about the artist's intent having more meaning than the viewers - I had to walk away from the computer. His later posts, including the one you have posted, seemed to carry on in the same vein. I found them unsettling.

Sorry that my suggestion of considering the artist's intent caused you anguish.

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@DrewDad,

DrewDad wrote:

wandeljw wrote:
The shitty and patronizing remark came first. My harsh language was in response.

Yes, the shitty and patronizing remark came first:

wandeljw wrote:

It occurred to me that Chai and Arella's reactions may be connected to unfortunate personal experiences in their own past. I do not want to devalue their honest personal feelings.

Now I understand your relentless mission to teach me a lesson. It is all my fault.

I have never said this to anyone at A2K before -- but you, drewdad, are a ******* moron.

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I characterized Wandel's remark as shitty and patronizing for the, to me, good and sufficient reason that it patently was. First, it implies that their judgment must be flawed because it is not consonant with his. Second, it implies that they must be, in DD's felicitous phrase, "damaged goods" incapable of reasonably judging the situation. That's a shitty thing to say to anyone, without knowing, and would be shitty even if he had certain knowledge that they had been victims of abuse at some time in the past. It is patronizing because it appears he claims that were they capable of reasonable judgment, they would of necessity agree with him, so he speculates on what horrible event caused them to be so incapable of resonable judgment. Nothing i've read in this thread since that passage convinces me that i was wrong in characterizing his remark in that manner.

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@wandeljw,

wandeljw wrote:

Now I understand your relentless mission to teach me a lesson. It is all my fault.

I was hoping that you might come to understand how offensive your remarks were. Yes, you are responsible for what you say.

wandeljw wrote:

I have never said this to anyone at A2K before -- but you, drewdad, are a ******* moron.

...in your opinion.

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@Setanta,

No, I don't buy this at all. He was not saying their judgement was 'flawed' and he was not saying they were 'damaged goods'. I am a woman. I was leered at, ogled, etc, for years. I don't consider myself damaged goods because of that... but it has certainly affected my opinions about what I see and I did not get that from his post at all - somehow, however, YOU got that opinion for your own reasons.

It is completely possible for two people to remember the same event and remember them very differently or remember different things about it. So then, is it not possible for two people to see someone's face and see two completely different things? For two people to hear the same thing and hear completely different things?

It's very subjective, especially without hearing tones, nuances, intonations and seeing facial and body expressions, etc.

Why can you not see that this is possible and you could simply be wrong about interpreting wandel's intentions?

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@Setanta,

Quote:

I characterized Wandel's remark as shitty and patronizing for the, to me, good and sufficient reason that it patently was. First, it implies that their judgment must be flawed because it is not consonant with his.

Gee, lucky that you've never suggested anything close to that described in your last sentence, above, Set.

"to me" = suggests an opinion

"it patently was" contradicts that statement which came roughly 6 word previous.

Quote:

Second, it implies that they must be, in DD's felicitous phrase, "damaged goods" incapable of reasonably judging the situation. That's a shitty thing to say to anyone, without knowing, and would be shitty even if he had certain knowledge that they had been victims of abuse at some time in the past.

Second is better than First. You hear that JW, you said what DD implied or, if I follow Set's comments correctly, you implied what DD said. I'm not sure which it is or which one you did.

Quote:

Nothing i've read in this thread since that passage convinces me that i was wrong in characterizing his remark in that manner.

But, it must be noted, Setanta is the president of the A2K Chickenshit Club.

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@wandeljw,

wandeljw wrote:

but you, drewdad, are a ******* moron.

I will add:

You started out patronizing, and went through defensive, condescending, minimizing, and invalidating.

Finally, you have devolved to abusive.

Ask yourself: Is this who you want to be?

3 Replies

Finally reading the article I began to ponder over the situation. It was 1951. I have seen movies of Italy after the war. Like most of the world there was hardship everywhere. In the 'Bicycle Thief' it shows Italy had many who were unemployed. The number of men standing around shows they were probably just hanging around without jobs. America seems to have escaped the devastation and most Americans could not possibly understand how desperate things were after the war. Maybe those men looked at the girl as 'meal ticket' to escape their misery so they were trying their best to impress her and get to America.

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@DrewDad,

You could be talking about yourself, you realize that, don't you?

1 Reply

@Mame,

I could not agree less. This was his remark:

Quote:

It occurred to me that Chai and Arella's reactions may be connected to unfortunate personal experiences in their own past. I do not want to devalue their honest personal feelings.

I didn't address Wandel's intentions. I judged his remark. "Unfortunate personal experiences" is hardly the same, to my mind, as simply having been leered at, or ogled. So as i've just written, i've seen nothing in this thread to convince me that i was wrong about his remark.

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@DrewDad,

Quote:

Finally, you have devolved to abusive.

DrewDad:
Don't let the fact that I'm being hypocritical as hell allow you to miss my true intentions; I only seek to make you into a better person, JW

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@Setanta,

Quote:

I didn't address Wandel's intentions. I judged his remark.

Fair enough, but you must take into consideration the fact that you are often wrong, Set.

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@Mame,

Mame wrote:

You could be talking about yourself, you realize that, don't you?

Care to quote my abuse?

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Being leered at, ogled, wolf whistled at, and suggestive comments made to you for a number of years by a number of men is, in my opinion, 'unfortunate personal experiences'. As is a host of other things. "Unfortunate" - what does that mean in this context, exactly? Again, it is subjective. Something you consider 'unfortunate', I might consider dire.

He was simply allowing the possibility of their witnessing, perhaps, hearing about, maybe, or experiencing themselves of an "unfortunate personal experience" to rule their emotions here. I think that's actually commendable. The act itself doesn't have to have had happened to you, personally, for it to be personal - it could have happened to a friend or family member and it would still be personal.

1 Reply

@DrewDad,

If you weren't such a chickenshit, DrewDad, you would have already had it explained to you.

0 Replies

@Setanta,

Quote:

I didn't address Wandel's intentions. I judged his remark.

By what criteria? If you didn't inquire as to his intentions, denied or failed to listen to his explanations, might you not have leaped to an unwarranted conclusion based on, as you've explained here, your own opinions.

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@DrewDad,

DrewDad wrote:

wandeljw wrote:
but you, drewdad, are a ******* moron.

I will add:

You started out patronizing, and went through defensive, condescending, minimizing, and invalidating.

Finally, you have devolved to abusive.

Ask yourself: Is this who you want to be?

This whole post is abusive and patronizing. All your comments to him have been.

1 Reply

@Mame,

Mame wrote:

Being leered at, ogled, wolf whistled at, and suggestive comments made to you for a number of years by a number of men is, in my opinion, 'unfortunate personal experiences'. As is a host of other things. "Unfortunate" - what does that mean in this context, exactly? Again, it is subjective. Something you consider 'unfortunate', I might consider dire.

He was simply allowing the possibility of their witnessing, perhaps, hearing about, maybe, or experiencing themselves of an "unfortunate personal experience" to rule their emotions here. I think that's actually commendable. The act itself doesn't have to have had happened to you, personally, for it to be personal - it could have happened to a friend or family member and it would still be personal.

So then, do you consider his remark reasonable enough to suggest that you are not yourself capable of reasonably judging the situation for that reason? Is it not the case that almost all, and probably all, women in the west where there is no purdah, no burkas, have been leered at, have been ogled? Are we to assume then that no woman is capable of reasonably judging the situation?

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Why would those experiences make us incapable of reasonable judgement? Hello? I'm really not getting that. Does that mean that any or all of our experiences render us incapable of reasonable judgement on those particular issues? So, if I'd been a storekeeper, I can't be on a jury in which a storekeeper was robbed? Come on, Set!

Wandel's remark was simply that their EMOTIONS might have been impacted by a previous personal (perhaps family or friend-related) incident and made them think she was scared, etc..- you know, projection.

1 Reply

@Mame,

You must not be getting it. You'd have to ask Wandel, he's the one who seems to think that unfortunate personal experiences render one incapable of reasonable judgement.

2 Replies

American girl in Italy, 60 years later

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